U.S. patent application number 13/260628 was filed with the patent office on 2012-02-02 for arrangement for an nfc compatible mobile device for delayed transfer of an established friend connection and a related method.
This patent application is currently assigned to SOLOCEM SYSTEMS OY. Invention is credited to Tuomo Tuikka.
Application Number | 20120028578 13/260628 |
Document ID | / |
Family ID | 40590279 |
Filed Date | 2012-02-02 |
United States Patent
Application |
20120028578 |
Kind Code |
A1 |
Tuikka; Tuomo |
February 2, 2012 |
ARRANGEMENT FOR AN NFC COMPATIBLE MOBILE DEVICE FOR DELAYED
TRANSFER OF AN ESTABLISHED FRIEND CONNECTION AND A RELATED
METHOD
Abstract
An arrangement for an NFC compatible mobile device for delayed
transfer of an established friend connection and a related method.
The arrangement is suitable, for example, for delaying the
transmission of information about a friend connection established
over the NFC relative to another NFC compatible device to a remote
device, such as a server, in that case the network connection is
not available or does not fulfill a predetermined criterion.
Inventors: |
Tuikka; Tuomo; (Oulu,
FI) |
Assignee: |
SOLOCEM SYSTEMS OY
Kempele
FI
|
Family ID: |
40590279 |
Appl. No.: |
13/260628 |
Filed: |
April 9, 2010 |
PCT Filed: |
April 9, 2010 |
PCT NO: |
PCT/FI10/50287 |
371 Date: |
September 27, 2011 |
Current U.S.
Class: |
455/41.1 |
Current CPC
Class: |
H04W 24/00 20130101;
H04W 8/24 20130101; H04W 76/10 20180201 |
Class at
Publication: |
455/41.1 |
International
Class: |
H04B 5/00 20060101
H04B005/00 |
Foreign Application Data
Date |
Code |
Application Number |
Apr 9, 2009 |
FI |
20095397 |
Claims
1. An arrangement for an NFC compatible mobile device comprising a
monitoring means configured to monitor the status of a network
connection and a storage means for storing information about a
friend connection established through data exchange over the NFC
with another NFC compatible device, wherein the arrangement further
comprising a controlling logic configured to store in the storage
means information about the established friend connection, to
obtain information related to the network connection status from
the monitoring means and to assess the applicability of the network
connection, and, if the network connection is not available or does
not fulfill a predetermined criterion, to delay the transmission of
the information about the established friend connection to a remote
device until the network is usable again.
2. An arrangement of claim 1, wherein the controlling logic is
configured to submit delayed transfer of the established friend
connection to a user of the NFC compatible mobile device.
3. An arrangement of claim 1, wherein the controlling logic is
configured to provide a user with a possibility to classify the
established friend connection into a category.
4. An arrangement of claim 3, wherein said categories are
determined by the user.
5. An arrangement of claim 3, wherein said categories are
predetermined.
6. A method for registering a friend connection in a remote device,
such as a server, to be performed by an NFC compatible device,
comprises: obtaining information about a friend connection
established over the NFC relative to another NFC compatible device,
storing the information about the established friend connection,
obtaining information related to the status of a network
connection, assessing the availability or applicability of the
network connection on the basis of the information related to the
status thereof, delaying transmitting the information about the
established friend connection to the remote device via the network
until the network becomes usable.
7. An arrangement claim 2 wherein the controlling logic is
configured to provide a user with a possibility to classify the
established friend connection into a category.
Description
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
[0001] Generally the invention relates to short-range communication
such as near field communication (NFC). In particular, the
invention concerns establishment of a friend connection by using
the NFC technology.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0002] Communication falling under NFC typically refers to
short-range wireless, i.e. contactless, communication following the
corresponding standard(s) aimed for simple and safe communication
between electronic devices. NFC communication is enabled by
bringing two NFC compatible devices within a short distance, e.g.
few centimeters, of one another. Contemporary applications of NFC
technology are associated with different financial transactions,
such as various payment and ticketing services, and simple data
access, e.g. data retrieval, solutions. NFC capability may be added
to a mobile terminal, a PDA (personal digital assistant), or some
other portable or even hand-held device, which can be, and often
is, carried along anyway. Technology-wise NFC is typically based on
inductive-coupling, which reminds of the technology behind RFID (RF
identification) tags and transponders. NFC technology is specified
in a plurality of standards relative to the applicable hardware
components and used data transfer methods. Standards are created,
maintained and/or adopted by entities including, but not limiting
to, ISO/IEC (International Organization for
Standardization/International
[0003] Electrotechnical Commission), ETSI (European
Telecommunications Standards Institute), ECMA (European association
for standardizing information and communication systems), GSMA (GSM
Association), The Wireless USB Promoter Group and Wi-Fi Alliance.
Large conglomerates such as Philips and Sony (e.g. FeliCa) have
been active in developing NFC compatible devices.
[0004] Social media applications such as Facebook, MySpace and
LinkedIn have gained tremendous popularity among the Internet users
since the beginning of the 2000's. The concept of establishing
various online communities through creation of an up-to-date
on-line user profile by a desktop or portable computing device in a
preferred social networking service and subsequently inviting a
number of friends or business contacts to join the service for
future information sharing seems to be the most typical
implementation approach depending on the focus of the service
(either business-oriented or a more like a buddy list). The users
belonging to the same sub-community, i.e. `friends` or `contacts`,
may often contribute to others' profiles and share thoughts, files,
links, and applications via the service whereas the remaining users
being not members of the same sub-community may only access limited
information related thereto. The social networking solutions thus
try to combine features from more traditional paper-form or
electronic personal address book, calendar, blogs, and web pages
into an aggregate (social) life portal for also others to use.
[0005] NFC-technique may be used to establish a friend connection
by bringing two NFC compatible devices within a short distance of
one other for information exchange. Then, the collected information
may be utilized in social media applications, such as Facebook.
However, creating a new friend connection may require an available
network connection via which related information is transferred
from an NFC compatible device to a remote server, for example. If
the network connection is too slow, erroneous, or totally absent,
establishing the friend connection remotely will fail. In the worst
case, establishing a friend connection begins properly between the
two NFC compatible devices, but while transferring the related
information forward the network connection is lost and the whole
procedure fails. Unfortunately, the user might not notice that and
he/she may lose valuable contact information.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0006] The objective is to improve social contacts network
formation and management overcoming at least some of the drawbacks
evident in the prior art arrangements.
[0007] The objective is met by an arrangement for an NFC compatible
mobile device in accordance with the present invention. For
example, a mobile application included in the mobile device may be
configured to monitor and notice, when the network connection is
too slow or missing, and to store information about a friend
connection in a memory for delayed transfer to a remote device such
as a server.
[0008] Accordingly, in one aspect an arrangement for an NFC
compatible mobile device comprises a monitoring means configured to
monitor the status of a network connection and a storage means for
storing information about a friend connection established through
data exchange over the NFC with another NFC compatible device,
wherein the arrangement further comprises a controlling logic
configured to store in the storage means information about the
established friend connection, to obtain information related to the
network connection status from the monitoring means and to assess
the applicability of the network connection, and, if the network
connection is not available or does not fulfill a predetermined
criterion, to delay the transmission of the information about the
established friend connection to a remote device until the network
is usable again.
[0009] In another aspect, a method for registering a friend
connection in a remote device, such as a server, to be performed by
an NFC compatible device, comprises:
[0010] obtaining information about a friend connection established
over the NFC relative to another NFC compatible device,
[0011] storing the information about the established friend
connection,
[0012] obtaining information related to the status of a network
connection,
[0013] assessing the availability or applicability of the network
connection on the basis of the information related to the status
thereof,
[0014] delaying transmitting the information about the established
friend connection to the remote device via the network until the
network becomes usable.
[0015] The utility of the present invention arises from plurality
of issues. The invention provides possibility to save time by
enabling the user to store the information about the friend
connection in the memory while the network is not available or
provides only insufficient data transfer capability. By such
feature, the user may avoid retrying to remotely register the
friend connection in the remote device; instead the application
ensures the creation of the friend connection.
[0016] In this patent application the expression "information about
a friend connection" may refer to any kind of contact information,
e.g. device-specific and/or user-specific information such as
corresponding IDs, exchanged between NFC compatible devices.
[0017] Various embodiments of the present invention are disclosed
in the dependent claims.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0018] Next the invention will be described in more detail with
reference to the following drawings:
[0019] FIG. 1 illustrates one use scenario of the present
invention.
[0020] FIG. 2 shows a block diagram of the arrangement for an NFC
compatible mobile device in accordance with the present
invention.
[0021] FIG. 3 is a flow diagram of an embodiment of a method
according to the present invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE EMBODIMENTS
[0022] FIG. 1 illustrates one use scenario of the present
invention. The users 102 of NFC compatible mobile devices have
brought their mobile devices 104 near to each other so that the
establishment 106 of the friend connection may begin. Information
about the established friend connection is meant to transfer 108,
110 to a remote device 112 via the communication network 114.
[0023] A merely exemplary way of technically registering a new
social contact via mating the associated mobile communications
devices through short-range wireless communication is now
explained. Both the users 102 have a mobile device 104 of their own
provided with necessary software for implementing a social contact
registration logic. The users 102 have activated a feature allowing
the establishment of new contacts via the supported short-range
wireless technology such as the NFC. The users 102 physically meet
each other, whereupon both of them are willing to add the other
party as a new social contact. The mobile devices 104 are set next
to each other and the social contact registration logics in both
devices mutually exchange relevant information. Consequently,
mobile viral social networks associated with the users 102 (and
mobile devices 104) are expanded. From a technical standpoint one
device may act as a master and the other as a slave during the
communication, for example. The exchanged information may be
delimited to the personal information and/or mobile device
information of the users 102 themselves, or data on
already-existing other social contacts may be optionally
transferred to a predetermined extent (e.g. mere names, aliases or
other ID's) as well.
[0024] Mobile devices 102 may forward the obtained information by
means of a social contact notification logic to remote entities 112
such as a service management server. In the example of FIG. 1 the
network connection for the transferring 110 is too slow and/or
malfunctioning or totally missing, so the created friend connection
is stored in the memory and the network connection status is
further monitored by the application either continuously or in a
timed manner, for instance. When the network connection becomes
available and applicable again, information about the established
friend connection is transferred to the remote entity 112.
[0025] In FIG. 2 is shown a block diagram of the arrangement for
NFC compatible mobile device in accordance with the present
invention. The arrangement comprises a monitoring means 202, a
storage means 204 and a controlling logic 206.
[0026] Monitoring means 202 may include, for example, a monitoring
logic block. Monitoring means 202 is configured to monitor the
status of the network connection, i.e. availability or
accessibility of the network connection. The monitoring may be
performed regularly, for instance once in a minute or once in ten
minutes, or the monitoring may be performed only before a transfer
attempt. The latter way is preferred, because it saves the battery.
In that case an established friend connection is stored in the
memory, the monitoring means 202 is configured to monitor the
network connection status more often, for example once in every 1-3
second, until the network connection is available again. The
monitoring may also be performed so that the controlling logic
sends instruction/instructions to the monitoring means while
requiring information of status of the network connection. The
monitoring means may store the status data to the storage means or
it may send the data direct to the controlling logic 206.
[0027] Storage means 204 is arranged for storing status data
relative to the network connection monitored by the monitoring
means and/or information about one or more established friend
connections to be transferred to a remote entity. Storage means 204
may be divided between one or more physical memory chips or other
memory elements, and it may comprise code, e.g. in a form of a
computer program/application for the controlling logic 206, and
other data. The storage means 204 does not have to necessarily be a
dedicated memory, as it may be formed in the overall memory of the
mobile device. However, the controlling logic has to have an access
to the memory. Moreover, the storage means 204 may further include
other storage media, such as a preferably detachable memory card or
a fixed storage medium such as hard drive. The storage means 204
may be non-volatile, e.g. ROM, PROM, EEPROM or flash memory, and/or
volatile, e.g. RAM, by nature.
[0028] Controlling logic 206 is configured to store in the storage
means 204 the information about the established friend
connection(s), to obtain the information related to the network
connection status from the monitoring means 202, to assess
availability of the network connection and, if the network
connection is not available, to delay the transfer of the
established friend connection until the network is available
again.
[0029] In FIG. 3 is a flow diagram of an embodiment of a method
according to the present invention. In the beginning, at 302 the
controlling logic obtains information about the established friend
connection. The friend connection is created by preferably
utilizing the NFC-technology in the NFC compatible devices, or some
other short-range wireless technology in other mobile devices. At
phase 304, the information about the established friend connection
is stored in the storage means. At phase 306, the controlling logic
obtains the information about the status of the network connection
from the monitoring unit. In one embodiment, the controlling logic
may, at first, send an instruction/instructions to the monitoring
means to monitor the status of the network connection, which may
take place especially in that case the monitoring means is not
configured to monitor the status of the network connection
regularly or the monitoring is performed rarely. Instead, in
another embodiment, wherein the monitoring means monitors the
status of the network connection regularly and frequently, the
controlling logic obtains the latest information of the network
connection status from the monitoring means by requesting it, or
the status may be sent to the controlling logic by the monitoring
means. Then, at 308, the controlling logic assesses the
availability of the network connection on the basis of the
information about the network connection status obtained from the
monitoring unit. If the network connection is available and
applicable 310, i.e. the connection is accessible and e.g. fast
enough, transfer of the information about the established friend
connection is performed 312.
[0030] On the other hand, if the network connection absents or is
too slow for transferring the information about the established
friend connection, the transfer will be delayed (notice "NO" path
in the figure). According to one embodiment, the controlling logic
may confirm delaying the transfer from the user, e.g. via a prompt
shown on the visual UI of the device, who then has possibility to
accept the delayed transfer or, for example, discard the transfer
completely. In some other embodiments delaying may be performed
routinely or the user might have preset the option to delay the
transfer. While the transfer is delayed, the controlling logic
continues to obtain the information about the status of the network
connection either by requesting the monitoring means to monitor the
status of the network or by obtaining the latest information from
the monitoring means continuously, and to assess the status of the
network connection, at phases 306, 308 and 310 until the network
connection is available again.
[0031] In a preferred embodiment the arrangement may provide a
possibility to a user to classify, on the basis of predetermined
categories, the type of the established friend connection. The type
of the friend connection might be, for example, "friend" or
"business associate" or "relative" to name a few. This feature can
associate with the feature of delayed transfer, or it can be used
independently. The categories can be determined by the user, or the
categories can be predetermined, for example, by applying the
categories of the common social media application.
[0032] The selected friend connection type may be transferred to a
remote entity such as a server of the used social media application
with the other friend connection-related information. Subsequently
the social media application may exploit type data for classifying
the friend connections or for other purposes.
* * * * *